Callie Reads Sauron Defeated

I've got a tradition where I read something related to Lord of the Rings, or something by Tolkien anyway, beginning every Sept. 22. That is, of course, Bilbo and Frodo's birthday, and the day he sets out from Bag End on the journey.

I started all that, I suppose, because I did a readthrough of the book three times at that time. In undergrad, I took a whole class on Tolkien, and the professor mentioned, as an offhanded aside, that people read the book according to the calendar dates. I wanted to from that point forward. In grad school I gave it a couple of tries, and succeeded the second time. I think the third I decided partway through to just read Fellowship; it was always my favorite anyway.

After that, I just started reading the history books I hadn't read. So this year it's Sauron Defeated, which covers the draft material for the end of Return of the King as well as some bits and pieces, such as The Notion Club Papers and the like.

Here are things of interest, at least to me. I'll be updating as I go.

Epilogue

Tolkien wrote two or three versions of an epilogue, and only took it out because his publisher didn't like it. He mentioned in at least one letter that he still wished, years later, that it had been included, that the book didn't really feel finished, but nobody had liked it.

I kind of like it. It is, mostly, the sort of epilogue you might expect. In fact, it's sort of hidden in the appendices, in the Tale of Years: it's an evening in Sam's study, where he reads a bit of the Red Book to the kids and then talks to them. The final version before it was cut winnows it down to Elanor, the oldest; the others are in bed already.

It's actually a bit clever, too. Sam is trying to continue the book, but all he's gotten to is answering his kids' questions from hearing the story and then writing those down, along with his answers. So we learn things like how the horse population of Rohan is on the upswing; how Gandalf took Shadowfax into the West; and that Merry and Pippin regularly go off to Rohan and Gondor.

The main thing of it is Sam's revelation that Aragorn is coming to visit -- that's the part that's in the Tale of Years. Aragorn wrote and explicitly asked to see Sam and Rose as well as all their children, all by name. And Tolkien wrote up the whole thing in Sindarin, so much is made of the kids, or at least Elanor, hearing all the kids' names in Elvish. Elanor, we learn, wants to see elves; she will finally get to.

It's not all just sort of sappy; Tolkien ends it precisly opposed to how the book ends as published: Sam closes the door, one arm around Rose, talking about how he has all the treasure in the world, and the narrator's final sentence says that he hears the sea just as he did when Frodo left. Also, he tells Elanor that the elves had said to him, when Frodo left, that he too could probably come if he wished, later, as he'd borne the Ring.

This is all stuff people quite freqently mine out of the Tale of Years now, so it's telling that Tolkien could feel as though it needed to be part of the narrative in a way that the tales of the battles between dwarves and orcs didn't, as heartbreaking and interesting as those were.